Games in the past had hard numbers because nothing else was possible. Lives were represented with small integers. Damage was mostly boolean.
Nowadays we have health bars that are more nuanced. It's possible to be kinda dead but still ok. It's more realistic but it's not realistic by any measure.
Naughty Dog took this even farther and didn't include health stats in Uncharted. Both enemies and the player have health but it's abstract and closer to real life. It's qualitative instead of quantitative, with limping enemies and a general "pain" feeling on screen when hurt. Lots of other games also worked in a similar way.
With modern AAA games becoming more RPG like though, this trend seems to have been abandoned. Games are going back to health bars and putting lots of numbers on complex systems. It makes lots of these games really fun, but is it good?
Is it something that is going to feel dated as graphics and animations continue to improve?
Nowadays we have health bars that are more nuanced. It's possible to be kinda dead but still ok. It's more realistic but it's not realistic by any measure.
Naughty Dog took this even farther and didn't include health stats in Uncharted. Both enemies and the player have health but it's abstract and closer to real life. It's qualitative instead of quantitative, with limping enemies and a general "pain" feeling on screen when hurt. Lots of other games also worked in a similar way.
With modern AAA games becoming more RPG like though, this trend seems to have been abandoned. Games are going back to health bars and putting lots of numbers on complex systems. It makes lots of these games really fun, but is it good?
Is it something that is going to feel dated as graphics and animations continue to improve?
